


How it feels to have a heartbeat

by GaiaYukari85



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: (don't worry it's gonna be fine), Eventual Happy Ending, Fluff and Angst, Homophobia, M/M, Major Character Undeath, ghost!dex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-31
Updated: 2017-12-08
Packaged: 2019-01-25 12:38:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,502
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12531560
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GaiaYukari85/pseuds/GaiaYukari85
Summary: “Ok, you can end it with your show. It's just me” Derek said to the apparently empty room. But as soon as he spoke, the lights went on and a figure appeared on the sofa.“Sorry, I thought it was your editor... or worst, your ex-husband...” muttered Will.Derek chuckled softly at the disappointed look on his ghost housemate.Yes, because Will was a ghost and was living with him.





	1. Chapter One

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer 1: No, i don't own Checkplease or its characters and i'm forever grateful to Ngozi to create it and let me use them for my pleasure  
> Disclaimer 2: Yes, the title is from Harry Styles's song "Two Ghosts"  
> Disclaimer 3: English is not my first language and this work is unbetaed. So if you want to apply for the job, have some critics/suggestions or spot some mistakes, please let me know!
> 
> *Update: thanks to the incredible work of ahandfuloftime, the best editor i could wish for, this fic is now beated and actually improved. Thanks to all the readers who left comments and kudos despite my very poor linguistic skills.

 

His steps creaked on the old floor, a high-pitched screech in the otherwise silent house. A door opened and closed even though he knew that he was the only one at home. A freezing breeze blew from the windows, despite the stillness of the humid evening outside.

Derek didn't bother to turn on the lights – he knew that wouldn't work – and instead groped around in the living room until he hit the coffee table and nearly knocked over the vase sitting on top of it.

“Shit!” he exclaimed reaching for the vase. It was a gift from Lardo so it was pretty cool and he didn't want to break it.

“Okay, you can end it with your show. It's just me,” Derek said to the ostensibly empty room.

But as soon as he spoke, the lights went on and a figure appeared on the sofa.

“Sorry, I thought it was your editor... or worse, your ex-husband...” Will muttered.

Derek chuckled softly at the disappointed look on the face of his ghost housemate.

Yes, Will was a ghost. And he was living with Derek. So he has a ghost housemate. It was chill. (Wasn't it?)

Technically, it was the other way round since he was already there when Derek moved in. So Derek was living with Will, he supposed.

When Derek first moved into the house, he found it to be a literal cliché. An old house, sitting on a little cliff that looked over Maine's wild shores, haunted by a restless spirit. His ancestors would have been terrified and would have done some shamanic rituals to get the ghosts away, but being born and raised in New York, Derek was accustomed to all of sorts of strange and creepy things, he was a writer searching for inspiration, after all, so he bought the house without much thinking, using the remaining money from his last book and settled in.

He was tired of dealing with people: his fellow authors, always ready to criticize his works but always smiling when talking to him; his parents, showing him support but waiting for some sort of catastrophe that would resign him to taking over the family business, and his  _dear_ husband, who was cheating on him a mere two months after the wedding ceremony.

So really, no one could blame him for losing confidence in humanity and searching instead for the company of ghosts, he thought.

He started to regret his decision when the first small “accidents” happened: the furniture changed position over the night, the lights went off and on even though he wasn't switching them, the doors sometimes refused to open and the hot water mysteriously stopped working every time he was taking a shower (the first time it happened, he yelped and stepped out the water spray and was fairly sure that he actually heard a distant laugh).

Derek was annoyed by the situation but the estate agent had warned him about what had happened to families who had tried to live in the property before, so he couldn't say he was not aware of the risks. The worst thing was that he hadn't found any inspiration for his next work yet and his editor was starting to press him.

So when he found the kitchen wall stained with raspberry jam spelling “FUCK OFF,” he lost his well-known chill and screamed: “That was my precious raspberry jam Bitty made me, you stupid ghost! Why didn't you use blood? Or even paint like The Canterville Ghost!”

He didn't actually expect an answer, but as soon as he marched to the sink to grab something to clean the jam from the wall, a voice behind him said.

“First, there's no paint in the house and second, who's the Canterville Ghost?”

Derek nearly jumped out of his skin and when he turned he was facing a boy, with red hair and impossibly honey-gold eyes, wearing jeans and a plaid shirt, and staring irritated at him with his arms crossed.

He almost seemed like a normal guy but then Derek realized he couldn't focus on him, like he was looking at him through an translucent glass.

“Well, you're not at all what I imagined,” he said, regaining his composure after a moment of shock.

“Like what?” the ghost snorted.

“I don't know... covered in rags and blood? Or maybe without the legs? More... incorporeal?”

The ghost snorted again: “What? You were expecting Casper the friendly ghost?”

“Wait. You know Casper but not the Canterville Ghost?” Now was Derek's turn to snort. He went to the bookcase and pulled a slim volume down the shelf.

“Here,” Derek handed the book to the ghost, who was looking at him, confused.

He took the book and started reading, Derek could see the concentration on his face and eyes lighting up when reading a funny passage.

Derek returned to the kitchen to make coffee. The situation required a very large amount of caffeine and when he returned to the living room the ghost was gone but the book was laying open on the sofa.

 

The morning after, Derek was internally debating if it was worth waking up or staying in the bed for the rest of the day, when the ghost reappeared at the foot of the bed.

He squeaked and fell off the bed in a tangle of bedsheets.

“All right, if this is going to be a recurring situation, you should stop appearing without warning,” Derek stated, a little exasperated by the ghost's laugh.

“Sorry, sorry...” he said “I wanted to let you know that I liked the book. It was very funny”

“It's Oscar Wilde, dude. Like, he basically invented irony,” Derek replied while disentangling himself from the bedsheets.

“Sorry it took a little to read but I had to concentrate a lot”

“Concentrate?”

“To read or to turn the pages... I have to focus a lot on the task when I want to touch things,” the ghost explained.

“So if you concentrate enough you can take my hand?” asked Derek extending his left hand to the incorporeal figure.

“Why?” the ghost seemed suspicious.

“'Cause I'm introducing myself. I'm Derek, but you can call me Nursey too.”

“Will, or Dex,” said the ghost and he moved to take his hand but his fingers only slipped though Derek's. Will looked disappointed.

“Dex?” Nursey promptly asked taking back his hand “Sounds like... a hockey nickname?”

“Uh. I don't know? I don't remember anything about...” Dex made a vague gesture with his hands.

“Uh. Sorry, I didn't mean to be rude,” Nursey said, he didn't know how to talk to a ghost, actually, maybe there were taboo topics?

Dex only shrugged but added: “I do remember ice, though... and the sensation of skating...maybe I played hockey?”

His voice was distant and his eyes unfocused.

Something clicked in Nursey's brain and suddenly he was eager for more details about his unconventional housemate.

But the sad look in Dex's eyes made him give up the subject for the moment.

 

After that, they fell in a sort of routine, Derek didn't let himself think about it, or he would admit the surreality of sharing a house with a ghost.

He was determined to find out more about Dex and his story (he thought he could use it for a good plot) but Will couldn't help him much apart from some reminiscence that were of no use.

Anyway, Derek gathered that he died between 1995 and 1998 since he did know the Casper movie but never heard about Harry Potter and didn't get the joke about Pevees and Nearly Headless Nick that Nursey made (that obviously called for a Harry Potter movie marathon – Dex really liked it even though Nursey explained him that books are way better, but it would take ages for the ghost to read them).

He thought that luck was on his side when he asked the old lady at the library in Portland, the only library within 40 km, but he quickly reconsidered his statement because he was presented with a pile of dusty thick binders that contained all the news that happened in the county in the period he was looking for.

He justified the hours spent in the library with his editor saying that he was researching for the new book, but when he didn't produce a single line in two months, he was paid a visit by the chief editor of the publishing company.

Clearly, Dex did not like that man, because he made a show of doors and windows slamming and menacing creaks. The chief editor didn't stop for a coffee, though Derek insisted, instead choosing to dash toward the front door. It took at least three attempts before he was able to open it with shaking hands and saying “Take your time with the book,” before leaving.

Nursey couldn't stop laughing for a good time.

All in all, living with a ghost may be useful.

 

Especially if your soon-to-be-ex-husband showed up totally unexpected one windy and rainy day in October. There was a time when Derek had found Mark's unpredictability charming, but now he was tense and felt like the whole house was vibrating in the effort not to crack in half (and maybe that wasn't just a sensation because he caught Mark taking a concerned glimpse at the glass clinking on the kitchen table).

“I... brought the divorce papers,” Mark said.

“Very thoughtful coming from you... or do you want just get rid of me?”

“Of course not... but... I thought that _you_ wanted to have nothing to do with me anymore... so the sooner the better, right?”

“Yeah, well, at least that part is right: I don't want to see you again,”

“I'm sorry, Derek. So sorry”

Derek just frowned.

“I... I shouldn't have married you when I was doubtful... but... I really wanted to make you happy.”

_Crack._

The light bulb of the lamp smashed and the house felt into the darkness.

“Um... sorry... it's an old house...” said Nursey searching for his phone to make a flashlight.

But Mark was faster pulling his phone out of his jeans pocket. He stared at it for a second and typed something. After getting an answer he excused himself to the bathroom.

“There's no bathroom on this floor. You have to go upstairs, second door on the right,”

Derek could hear him muttering about living in an uncivilized world, but was distracted by Dex appearing at his side.

“He's an asshole,” the ghost stated.

Incidentally, that was Derek's sister's judgment when she had met Mark for the first time, Derek obviously didn't agree and started to list his qualities. God, he was so gone for him. And thinking about it now, Derek could admit that Farah was right.

“Yeah, he is,”

But Dex was already gone and after a second Nursey heard Mark's scream. He rushed towards the bathroom but the door was locked.

“Mark? You all right?”

“Yeah, yeah, I'm fine... the water was boiling... even if I turned the cold one,” Mark said and tried to exit the room but the door was unmoving.

“What the fuck...?” he tried pulling and pushing but nothing changed.

Derek heard Dex's laugh like a distant echo that resonated trough the walls.

“Okay, Will, let him go,” sighed Nursey when Mark started screaming again.

The door opened and Mark nearly tumbled down in his haste of getting away from the bathroom away from the bathroom.

“Sorry, Mark. It seems that he doesn't like you,”

“He??”

“My ghost housemate.”

Dex appeared behind him glaring at Mark.

This convinced Mark to leave as fast as he could.

Nursey flopped heavily on the sofa. He felt exhausted.

“You know what was the worst thing when I found out that he was cheating on me?”

Dex didn't nod or move but his eyes were on Derek intently.

“That it would have hurt... or affected me... but nothing. It was like, whatever.”

Nursey felt something cold and realized that was Will's hand placed on his. The ghost smiled easing the crease on his forehead, a sign of the level of concentration it had taken.

And Derek somehow, somewhere deep in his gut, despite the subzero fingers lacing with his, felt warm.

 

 

 

So, Nursey was living with a ghost. And it wasn't the most strange arrangement he'd lived in, to be honest, as he spent his college years in a frat house. Dex was without doubt a more quiet housemate than Ransom or Holster.

“Speaking of the devil...” Derek muttered glancing at the illuminated phone display.

“Hey man. Sup?”

He wasn't sure to whom he would be speaking because everytime he called Ransom or Holster, the other picked up, so he just saved their numbers as “Rans&Holst 1” and “2”.

This time was Justin.

“Hey bro. I didn't heard from in like... centuries! Not cool, bro”

And then they chat for about 20 minutes about nothing really important when Rans dropped the bomb: “Bro, listen, Adam and I had the sickest idea: why we don't have a Halloween party at your haunted house?”

Nursey choked “What?”

Dex appeared immediately looking concerned.

“Ugh... my house isn't haunted... where did you hear it?”

Apparently, the rumors spread fast after Mark's visit. Nursey tried to deny them, but he couldn't quite convince Justin, so when he hung up it had been decided that it was his turn to host the “traditional” Samwell Hockey Halloween party.

The frown on Dex's face only deepened at the news.

“Don't worry. They're a bunch of weirdos but they're cool,”

Dex shrugged but then noticed the binder on the table.

“What is this?” he started turning the pages. “Why...?”

“Oh... um... I'm doing some research...”

“Research about what?”

But Will already knew the answer and the house began shaking.

“Dex, stop, please!” Nursey was alarmed. “I was trying to help...”

“I didn't ask you to... I don't want to _know_ how....”

Now Dex's figure was shaking too and losing sharpness.

“Sorry! I should have asked you...” Nursey tried to grab his shoulders but when he reached for the ghost, he had already vanished.

 

Dex did not reappear as his usual the day after, nor the following days. Now that the old house was empty and cold, Nursey started hating it but, Halloween was approaching and he had to prepare for the party.

Perched on the steel ladder he was wondering if it was reasonable to put the fake webs on or to wait for the spiders living on the ceiling to do their jobs when he lost balance.

“Well, this is a dumb way to die,” was all he could think while falling off the ladder.

But a pair of strong arms stopped the fall.

“You're such a klutz,” said Will.

“Dex? How...?”

Will was solid under his touch and his figure wasn't blurry. Nursey could see clearly the gold hint in his honey eyes.

“My powers grow when it's Halloween and I can be corporeal with less effort,” he explained letting Nursey go when he was sure he can stand on his legs.

“I think... I... I'm sorry” Dex said looking at the floor. “I overreacted and your intention was good and... I'm sorry.”

Nursey beamed at him.

“I'll forgive you if you help me. Thank God, Bitty's in charge of the food but I need to make the room Ransom-and-Holster-proof before they arrive for the party.”

 

The party was in full swing when Derek realized he hadn't seen Will in a while, though he spent the first part of the night never leaving his side (Nursey had introduced him as “his neighbor Will” to his friends and they easily accepted it).

He found him in the back porch gazing toward the sea, a black stain down the hill.

“I've always loved the smell of the sea but now it makes me... scared?”

A chill run down his spine.

“Oh”

Will's eyes wear big of fear and full of tears. “I remembered.”

This time, Derek was quick to pull him in a hug and Will muttered against his shirt: “I remembered how... I died.”

“Do you want to tell me?” Nursey asked hesitantly.

For a long minute there was no answer but then Dex had a long sigh and started talking: “You were right: I played in the hockey team of my high school and I... I have... had... a crush on my line partner. Defensemen. We were best friends, unstoppable on the ice and inseparable off.”

Dex's lips curved in a faint smile.

“For a stupid fucking moment I thought he was feeling the same and I kissed him and... he told the rest of the team”

Nursey held his breath.

“They chased me but I ran to the cliff. I'd always gone there with my uncle so I knew where put the step but... the rocks were slippery... and...”

Will tied his grip on Nursey's shirt.

“Stop, please,” he said.

“Thank you, Derek,” Dex murmured “I think you pushed me to remember my life.”

“Sorry. I didn't realize it would be so painful for you.”

Dex shook his head “No. I'm happy. Now I remember my family too... and the sensation of the sea on my skin... and how to fix an oven-”

But he was interrupted by Nursey's lips pressing against his.

“I love you,” Nursey whispered.

“You _can't_ , Derek... I'm dead,” Will said dryly.

“I was dead before I met you. When I'm with you... I remember how it feels to have a heartbeat” Derek said.

Dex took Nursey's hand and placed it on his chest. Nothing. Where there would be the steady sound of the heart pumping, there was nothing. It was like an empty box.

Nursey stared at Dex.

Then Will leaned in and kissed him, hard and desperate.

 

The morning after, the spot in the bed next to Nursey was empty. There was no sign of Will anywhere except for the writing made with raspberry jam on the kitchen wall: “LOVE YOU TOO”.

 

 

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was toying with the idea for this story for a long time and thought that Halloween was the perfect time to finally write it. As usual, the final result is very distant from what was in my mind but yeah...  
> I'm working on the epilogue (don't worry, there's Eventual Happy Ending tag for a reason), but i'm going to be out of town for the next week so i will post it later!


	2. Epilogue

 

“Thanks for joining us today,” Derek said, writing his name on the first page of the book a small girl with pigtails handed him.

The girl smiled, revealing a little hole in her front teeth, then ran away to her mom who was waiting at the bookshop entrance.

Derek has always hated signing book events when he was writing young adult fiction but now that his audience's average age was significantly lower and the questions were more funny he was enjoying every single minute.

“My friend is a ghost”, his last work, even though was not his most memorable or original story, was very well welcomed by the critics and experts of books for children sector.

The book told the story about a boy, who follows his family in a new town and befriends the little ghost living in the new house. The ghost, in turn, makes the boy accept himself explaining in simple terms concepts like sexuality. It was a great success especially when a teacher made her students read it.

The next person in line stood before the little desk where Derek was scribbling.

“Who am I making this out to?” he asked without raising his eyes from where the pen met the page.

“Will,” the stranger responded, voice deep, clearly it wasn't for him but for his child, or nephew or...

“Funny, the ghost's name is Will...” finally Derek raised his gaze handing him the book and he stopped breathing because standing in front of him was Will. _His_ Will. Figure clear, solid, _corporeal_.

“Yeah, I know...” Dex smiled shyly.

A million question formed in Nursey's mind but none seems worth being put into actual words so he just gurgled something.

“I'll wait for you over there,” Dex pointed to the group of armchairs placed in a corner of the shop “And I'll explain everything, okay?”

Nursey just nodded and made an effort to concentrate on the next customer.

When the last copy was signed and his editor was talking to the bookshop owner, Derek rushed to Will, nearly knocking over two armchairs.

“Are you really here?” Nursey couldn't believe it yet.

Dex took gently his hand and placed it over his chest.  _Tum-tum_ . Derek felt Will's heartbeat (slightly faster than it should be) and smiled.

“I woke up in a hospital 5 months ago. The doctors said I was in a coma for years but I didn't remember a thing except you,” Dex explained, pain in his eyes.

But the he grinned.

“It wasn't hard to find you when your name was in every newspaper. The physiotherapy, that was hard though...”

Nursey tightened his grip on Dex's shirt and pressed their bodies together.

The kiss was soft but hit them like a crash and they parted breathless.

“I have an interview tomorrow morning,” said Derek. “My new publishing company worked really hard for the launch of the book. But then we can go home.”

“Home?” Will's eyes sparkled.

“Home,” repeated Derek squeezing his hand.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I apologize for being so late! I had a huge work with crazy deadline and then I got the flu and then... here we are, consider this final chapter my Christmas gift! I'd like to thank all the people who had left kudos or a comment or simply had read this work. Thank you!

**Author's Note:**

> I was toying with the idea for this story for a long time and thought that Halloween was the perfect time to finally write it. As usual, the final result is very distant from what was in my mind but yeah...  
> I'm working on the epilogue (don't worry, there's Eventual Happy Ending tag for a reason), but i'm going to be out of town for the next week so i will post it later!


End file.
